Edwards on Hardball - Wal-Mart and unions

First Labour Union Formed at Chinese Wal-Mart Store

Illustration from DesignWorks

From the AP, via KFSM:

BEIJING -- An official Chinese news agency says the first labor union at a Wal-Mart store in China has been formed following a lobbying campaign by the country's official union group. The official Xinhua News Agency reported today that 30 employees at a Wal-Mart store in the southeastern city of Quanzhou, in Fujian province, voted Saturday to form a union.

The news agency said a 29-year-old employee named Ke Yunlong was elected chairman of its seven-member committee.

The official All-China Federation of Trade Unions has been lobbying Wal-Mart tores Inc. for two years to organize employees of its 60 stores in China. The federation had accused the company of obstructing its efforts.

Wal-Mart opened its first Chinese outlet in 1996 and says it has 28,000 employees in China. It says it plans to add 18 to 20 stores on the mainland this year. Phone calls today to Wal-Mart's China headquarters in the southern city of Shenzhen weren't answered.

Wal-Mart On the Decline

From TPM House of Labour, check this out:

[...]
Even more to the point, the number of regular shoppers at Wal-Mart has fallen significantly. At the beginning of 2005, 69% of the population shopped at the company at least once or twice a month. That dropped to 51% by November.

Here's the shocking finding-- progressives have been able to create a significant shift in public opinion and shopping habits, a testament to the strong coalitions built in the last year.

Wal-Mart Loosing the PR War

Love Mom, Not Wal-Mart

In the struggle to unionize Wal-Mart, it seems that the momentum has swung decidedly to the side of the workers. CNTODD at Freiheit und Wissen highlights a recent article in the NY Times (read his post here). For this Mother's Day (Sunday, May 8th), The UFCW unveiled the "Mother of all Mother's Day" card; an 8 foot by 8 foot Mother's Day card which is a symbol of Wal-Mart's discrimination record against women workers.

The good news here is the sheer scale of the movement to bring Wal-Mart into check. Along with the UFCW, the SEIU has launched a campaign to help in orgainzing Wal-Mart. Members of the IWW/IU 660 Retail Workers Union have started a Wal-Mart wiki.

The overall impact is that the general citizenry and elected officials are waking up to the fact that Wal-Mart is bad for communities and bad for people. There are dozens of politicians mobilizing against the unjust interests of Wal-Mart, and Wal-Mart's sweetheart DOL deal is under increasing scrutiny (Dems with balls!).

This is a watershed moment in the history of labor activism post 9/11. Across the country and the world labor is letting managment know that they are sick and tired of the status quo and that the works will simply not take it any more.

Solidarity brothers and sisters -- and mothers!